


Birds of a Feather

by teakturn



Category: Black Panther (2018)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Assassins & Hitmen, Erik-centric, F/M, Hurt/Comfort, One Shot, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-14
Updated: 2019-07-14
Packaged: 2020-06-28 06:26:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,753
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19806565
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/teakturn/pseuds/teakturn
Summary: Bleeding out in the middle of a city? Why not make a pitstop at your sometimes enemy's safe house?





	Birds of a Feather

It was a long shot that he was home. A total shot in the dark that this apartment in the middle of downtown LA was still a safe house. Still, Sun limped her way to the sixth floor and knocked on the dirty green door with a confidence she didn’t feel. And a curse. _Gotta remember not to lift my arm so high next time_.

The silence on the other side of the door stretched from seconds to minutes so Sun knocked again, this time with her foot. _BANG BANG BANG_ The force of her kicks left a noticeable scuff on the door. She was impatient, hurt, and exhausted. Sun didn’t care if she woke up the whole hallway with her banging as long as she was horizontal on something hopefully soft in the next five minutes. 

_I’ll apologize when he opens that door_ , Sun pressed a hand harder to the burning pain in her side and suppressed a hiss of pain, _If he has bandages I’ll even say thank you._

Sun smile when she heard the telltale sound of floorboards shifting under someone’s weight. There was no shift in light underneath the door frame but that wasn’t surprising. Erik knew better than that. Instinctively she knew he was looking through the peephole so Sun waved and smiled.

“Open up, already!”

The door opened a crack revealing Erik in all his shirtless scowling glory. He looked just as Sun had remembered; tall, brown, and handsome. The raised scarring caught the fluorescent hallway light distractingly. The sudden rush of arousal through the pain reminded her of the night she’d ran her fingers across his skin just for the hell of it. He’d been tied up at the time, mostly to keep him out of Sun’s way, but she wouldn’t lie and say that she hadn’t taken express pleasure in the look of murder and frustration he shot her when he couldn’t get out the ropes. He’d looked so off-limits and her fingers had this itch Sun couldn’t ignore.

Sun smiled at him because she knew it made her bruises look gnarly in the harsh, greenish light. Erik returned her smile with an up and down flick of his eyes, then he glanced behind her. As if she’d have been stupid enough to knock if someone was chasing her. Sun was reckless but she wasn’t stupid.

Erik opened the door wider, revealing a gun and his dark apartment. Sun limped past him, pausing once to lift one bloodied hand to pat at his cheek. That earned her a growl. She was pushing it she knew but he looked so cute when he frowned she couldn’t help it.

Sun couldn’t see much of Erik’s apartment as her eye instinctively sought access points and counted the number of windows. The floor looked like cheap linoleum and created a slightly sickening sucking sound as her blood-covered boots hit the ground. The couch looked lived in and inviting yet Sun bypassed it to check out the kitchen. No window there but there was a knife block with knives that looked just balanced enough to serve her purposes.

She plucked a paring knife from the block and limped her way back to the living, to Erik staring at her expectantly near the now-closed (and hopefully locked) entryway.

“Should I be expecting more company?” Erik’s eyes studied her slow trek to the couch. His eyebrows furrowed when he noticed the slow drip of blood from her hand leaving a trail in her wake.

“Nah,” Sun waved him off. With a relieved sigh she lowered herself down onto the couch. It took more control than she reasonably had not to pass out when she extended her torso so she could rest on the back of the couch.

Sucking his teeth, Erik tucked his gun in the waistband of his sweat pants and left the room. He returned not even a minute later holding a first aid kit, a handful of towels, and a half-full bottle of Hennessy. He handed Sun the bottle, top off, and then set to work dropping towels around their feet and tucking them in between her body and the couch.

“Showing up at my door, no phone call, dripping blood, and now you just gone sit on my fucking couch….” The rest of his old man grumbling was lost when Erik peeled her hands away from her wound, causing a ripple effect of the most abrupt, searing pain Sun had ever felt in her life. She bit her lip to keep from screaming, tasting blood when her bottom lip began bleeding again.

“Fuck, Erik be careful!”

Erik shot Sun a dry look and went back to studying the dark patch of blood on her abdomen, “I’m gonna have to get that shirt off to assess the full damage.” without wasting any time Erik took a pair of scissors out of the kit and started cutting up the front of her shirt.

“At least buy me dinner first,” Sun tried to laugh but breathing was painful enough at the moment. She settled for fluttering her eyelashes. She had one eye hidden behind a patch and the other eye nearly hidden by the swelling on her brow bone. And yet she fluttered her eyelashes like she had to get to the airport and Erik had taken her passport.

“Didn’t have to do that shit the last time,” Erik got her shirt off and tossed it to the pile of towels on the floor.

“Good point,” Sun took a fortifying swig of cognac and looked around the room.

As far as safe houses go it wasn’t the prettiest. The furniture was as outdated as the kitchen and the popcorn ceilings so common in many LA apartments was like a shot of reality in Sun’s usually surreal life. It was too late and too dark to get an idea of the view from the windows so Sun moved on and began looking at the small hallway likely leading to the bathroom and Erik’s bedroom. 

The most surprising part of the space was how at home Erik looked here. He’d opened the door barefoot and in sweats. There were books on the coffee table and she could smell the remnants of whatever he’d cooked for dinner still lingering in the air. Her kicking probably woke him up just as he’d settled into bed for the night. From Sun’s limited memory of his nightly habits, she knew Erik had insomnia and it took him hours to get to sleep.

Erik assessed her wound silently. He pressed around the skin looking for any bullet fragments but pulled away at Sun’s pained hiss.

“Weapon was a three, maybe four, inch pocket knife.” Sun rattled off between gritted teeth, “They got me good before I could get it away from them but that’s the only open wound. Although I’m pretty sure my ribs are bruised too.”

Erik absorbed this information with a nod, “You might need stitches if the bleeding doesn’t stop,”

Sun shook her head, “Nah, I'm good. I’ll just sleep it off.”

Erik smacked his teeth, “So you just gone bleed out then, right on my fucking couch?”

“I’m not gonna bleed out you’re being dramatic,”

“Dramatic-” Erik spluttered, “You’re bleeding right the fuck now. I’m looking at it” He grabbed her hand and raised it between them, “Are _you_ looking at it?”

Snatching her hand from his grasp Sun let her annoyance at his pestering show on her face, “I’m sorry, is this _our_ stab wound?”

Erik tapped her forehead, hard, “Think,”

Sun swatted his hand away, glaring when he dared to raise another one of his ashy-knuckled fingers her way.“I _am_ thinking. I know exactly what I’m doing and where I’m going so I’d thank you to keep your concern to yourself.” with a softer smile Sun linked her fingers with his. 

Erik was rarely affected by her charm but that didn’t stop her from flirting, “And besides, I know I’m in the hands of one of the smartest men in the country. If anyone can patch me up and keep away infection it should be you.”

Erik being Erik accepted her blatant flattery with a roll of his eyes and a loud, “HA,” All the same he turned back to the kit and pulled out a needle and thread and some wipes. He didn’t pull his hand out of her grip though.

“Better start drinking, this one’s gonna hurt, princess.”

And hurt it did. For what felt like hours Sun sat as still as possible while Erik cleaned and dressed her wound. He checked her ribs to make sure they were bruised and not actually broken and then wrapped her torso in what felt like a mile of bandages to keep her from putting unnecessary stress on them. Sun did her part by drinking every time she wanted to scream and then cursing like Erik when the alcohol didn’t help. Eventually, Erik left her on the couch to rest, taking the soiled towels, the fragments of her shirt, and the first aid kit with him on his way out. He returned with a thick looking blanket and a pillow.

Sun’s mouth turned down in disappointment, “You’re making me sleep on the couch?”

“You know damn well we can’t sleep together,” Erik threw the bundle in his arms on the couch with no ceremony. 

“That hasn’t stopped us before,”

“You know what I mean. You wiggle around too much in your sleep and I can’t sleep with someone in the same bed as me.” Erik shrugged and turned to go back to his bed. It was nearly 3:00 am when she’d shown up. The pain killed any concept she had of time passing so Sun assumed he must be exhausted. One could never actually tell with Erik.

Carefully so she didn’t disturb her wound, Sun began building momentum to leverage herself off the couch. It created a funny movement of her trying to rock her torso while at the same time kicking her leg for momentum and trying not to extend too much. The last thing she wanted to do was disturb the bandaging around her ribs. 

Erik watched all of this with exhausted amusement, “What the fuck are you doing now?”

“I’d refuse to sleep on this couch even if I hadn’t been cut open by the equivalent of a letter opener.” Light bouncing, Sun added a bit of light bouncing to her choreography. Any second now she’d get on her feet and Erik would have to suck it.

“What’s wrong with the couch?”

“Umm, it’s not even clean!” 

“Well, it was,” Erik shot back defensively, “Then yo ass came in and started bleedin everywhere!”

Sun finally managed to get enough momentum to rock up to her feet. She wobbled a second, then gathered her balance and stood up as straight as her bandages would allow her to. It was painful and she was pretty sure she was bleeding again--if she’d ever stopped--but the loss of blood and all the alcohol caught up with her at once. As quickly as she’d gone up she was back down again. Her knees gave out and Sun fell back into the couch. 

Every ache and pain in her body increased tenfold and she nearly blacked out when her ribs started aching again. “Fuck! Shit fuck, bitch!”

“See, that’s what you get,” Erik shook his head and laughed at her pain. Sun couldn’t be mad, if their situations were reversed she’d be doing the same thing.

“Look if you’re going to get in my bed you’re gonna need to clean up. Can’t have you fuckin up my sheets, now.”

Sun shot him a sultry look through her grimace of pain, “Why Erik, are you trying to get me naked?”

Erik snorted and scooped Sun into his arms, “Ain’t nothing I ain’t seen before.”

“You’d be surprised,” Sun wrapped her arms around Erik’s neck and gave him a bloody kiss right on his cheek, “I’ve been around the block since you last seen me.”

Erik’s eyebrow cocked up, “Word?” He adjusted her in his grip which resulted in some painful jostling but eventually, he had her settled comfortably.

“Hmhmm,” Sun rested her forehead against Erik’s neck and breathed in the warm, spicy scent of him, “Figured I give you something to look forward to the next time I saw you.”

Erik became silent at that. Sun began to drift along the shores of sleep, content in Erik’s arms. Like a spoiled brat she’d never been allowed to be, Sun luxuriated in Erik’s hold. At some point between the living room and the bathroom, she'd slipped into a light doze lingering on the edge of full-blown sleep. The warmth from the cognac had her feeling weightless and drowsy.

As a painkiller, it was kind of shit but Sun doubted anything could truly dull the passion from bruised ribs and a stab wound.

Erik gave Sun a shake, "Wake yo' ass up!"

"Ugh, what?"

"You need to bathe, Sun," Erik said bluntly. He set her on the toilet and then turned to the sink, "You can't get your bandages wet so it'll have to be a cat bath." 

He leaned out of the doorway and rifled through the nearest hall closet. When he twisted back to face her, he held a face towel. After a moment of rifling under the sink, he produced a travel toothbrush still in its packaging. A little travel-sized tube of toothpaste joined it on the counter.

"I'll go get you some spare clothes," Erik turned and left the room only to lean back in a second later and fix Sun with a stern look, "Don't get my floor wet. Cause injured or not I'll make your limpin' ass clean it up."

Sun stuck her tongue out at his retreating form and snatched up the toothpaste. 

It took longer than usual due to her ribs but Sun was able to strip down to her panties with only minor swearing. By then she'd worked up a good sweat causing all the dried blood still covering her skin to go tacky. Sun focused first and foremost on the blood. The stuff had gotten everywhere and was starting to peel off her skin with every brush of the rag. She kept leaving bloody smudges on the white porcelain sink and faucet.

Sun was still scrubbing at the blood covering her torso when Erik returned with a large shirt and a pair of sweats. She glared at the unflattering items but Erik was gone before she could make a smart remark about it. 

A lot of soap, water, and swearing later and Sun was ready for bed. She could drop off to sleep right on the toilet if she relaxed too much. Luckily for her, her injuries made it nearly impossible to relax. Instead, she was forced to sit uncomfortably slouched, and grip the counter to keep herself from leaning too far to one side.

“Erik!” Sun added some honey to her hoarse voice and trilled the words so that his name sounded like a song coming out of her lips.

Erik appeared in the doorway of the bathroom looking as grumpy as she’d ever seen him. Had he dozed off? Sun narrowed her eyes at him and studied his form. He was still shirtless, her blood splattered his gray sweatpants, and his locs were haphazardly sticking up in the air. Her study was interrupted as he once again lifted her up into his arms and carried her out of the bathroom. He placed Sun on the bed and checked her wound one last time before disappearing. She could hear him puttering around in the bathroom, probably cleaning up after despite his promise to make her do it herself.

Sun smiled to herself. _He’s such a sweetie, all bark, no bite_. _Well_ , Sun amended remembering the second time they’d met when he’d unleashed a semi-automatic at a wall she was using as cover, _some bite_.

Tired, sore, and a little tipsy Sun laid on her back and tried her hardest not to disturb her ribs or a wound. Like the rest of the safe house, Erik’s bedroom had the bare essentials; a mattress, one pillow, and a duffle bag shoved not quite out of her sight in the closet. 

Curiosity pulled at her but Sun’s body won out in the end. She slipped into a deep, dreamless sleep before Erik even returned from the bathroom.


End file.
